Sheriff’s Decal Idea Doesn’t Stick

Responding in part to public criticism, Orange County Sheriff Mike Carona announced Friday that he has abandoned a proposal to add his name to the department’s roughly 300 patrol cars.

Letters, calls and e-mail--most of them critical--have poured into the Sheriff’s Department since the proposal became public last month. Carona said the decision to kill the plan was made at a meeting of his top staff two weeks ago.

The sheriff himself called the plan a clever but flawed marketing concept. He stressed, however, that details were made public before staff members could carefully review the matter and that no final decision had been made.

“The name on the car ended up being not such a great idea,” Carona said. “Clearly public opinion had an effect, but it wasn’t the sole reason for our conclusion.”

The plan, Carona said, was conceived in an effort to make himself more accountable to the public for the performance of deputies. The department already manufactures its own insignias for patrol cars, so officials estimated that the cost of adorning cruisers with removable “Michael S. Carona” decals would have been negligible.

But many saw the plan as an attempt to help Carona’s reelection efforts by boosting his name recognition--a contention that Carona strongly disputed.

“I thought it was needless self-promotion at taxpayer expense,” said Bill Mitchell, former Orange County chairman of Common Cause. “[But] I give him credit for listening to public reaction.”

The decision to dump the plan will not, however, affect efforts to redesign the appearance of department cruisers.

Carona said he intends to push ahead with a move that would decorate the cars with seals and slogans from the 10 Orange County cities that contract with the Sheriff’s Deparment. The move, he said, would “show the cities that we’re part of their communities.”

A committee of city managers, department staff and deputies union officials will work out details for a final design.